How we can help

PARCS is an organisation based within Portsmouth City that works with people who have been sexually violated at any time in their lives no matter how long ago.

PARCS provides free specialist counselling and psychotherapy to all genders, aged 5+ who are resident in Portsmouth and South East Hampshire and who have experienced any form of sexual violation at any time in their lives.

Counselling

Counselling is an opportunity to explore feelings, thoughts and behaviours that are overwhelming you or that you want to understand or change.

You will have regular meetings with a person who has been trained to listen carefully to what you say, and to respond in a way that will help you look at yourself and your experiences differently.

Domestic abuse

PARCS provides a free, specialist counselling service for victims of domestic abuse.

Our service is committed to raising awareness of domestic abuse in the community and to working with other professionals and agencies whose clients may be affected by interpersonal abuse.

Young persons service

PARCS aims to promote healthy relationships and to help young people, age 11 and above living in Portsmouth and SE Hants, who have had any unwanted sexual experience.

The Service offers free face to face counselling to young people, aged 11-24.

Helplines

Providing information and emotional support for anyone aged 18+ who has had an unwanted sexual experience. The supportlines also provide support and information to friends, partners, family and professionals.

The supportline team can offer support in relation to the difficult feelings commonly associated with sexual abuse, whether recent or historical.

Prevention

PARCS provides training to educate and inform individuals, agencies and statutory organisations about the effects of sexual violation and trauma on individuals and families. If you are interested in receiving training contact the number below.

PARCS is always happy to come and visit organisations and discuss, in small groups, the work that we do.

Hampshire service

PARCS Hampshire service currently runs on Mondays and Tuesdays to all survivors of sexual abuse.

This service is offered to individuals living in the South East Hampshire who live in the boroughs of: Gosport, Fareham and Havant.

Please become a part of PARCS history and help us raise vital funds to support our new premises - Diana House and keep a roof over our organisation and our elephant. Please buy a tile at a suggested price and have it embroidered with a chosen name for future posterity. The embroidered tiles will be proudly displayed in our new premises above our elephant identifying your help and support for our work and ensuring we can maintain our premises and allow our work to continue. We will also be posting fundraising updates via social media.

Our goal is to raise £20,000 each year to secure and maintain our new premises

·PARCS has bought its own premises in 2018

·PARCS is funded through statutory contracts, grant funding and fund raising 5% of funds come from fund raising activities which are used to develop services

·PARCS now needs to specifically raise funds to maintain Diana House

·PARCS identified it needed to secure appropriate accommodation to continue to deliver quality services and meet the continuing growing need for services for people (children and adults) affected by all forms of domestic and sexual abuse

·PARCS believes that anyone who has suffered sexual or domestic abuse should have access to free specialist therapy and counselling and a safe space where they can make sense of what has happened to them

·PARCS also provides other forms of support and advocacy and delivers an awareness and education programme into the local community aimed at challenging the cultures that support sexual and domestic abuse

Activities

·PARCS delivered 6893 counselling hours adults and children in 2016 and 7334 in 2017

·489 hours of emotional telephone support (2017-18)

·96 peer led groups (2017-18)

·783 young people attended outreach and prevention groups (2017-18)

·100 volunteers were provided with support and training (2017-18)

The difference PARCS makes

‘I’ve been coming to PARCS for several months now and I am so grateful for the support I receive here. I’ve got a long way to go but I know I’ll get to inner peace. The counsellor is a wonderful listener and very supportive. Thank you to all the staff here and for all you do to help people’. (Adult Survivor)

‘PARCS is amazing. Thank you so much. Every week I feel better for coming here. In that room I can be myself and feel so safe. I don’t feel judged, hated or disbelieved. I feel like I am worth something and I am more than just what happened to me’. (Adult Survivor)

'When our son was sexually assaulted the effect on our family was catastrophic. Our son turned from a happy, funny 9 year old, into an angry, frightened and anxious child. PARCS changed all of that. Our son’s weekly session has helped him, and us, not only come to terms with what happened but also taught us how to move forward with confidence and optimism. Now we see our precious little boy smile again. He laughs, he sleeps and we all thank PARCS from the bottom of our hearts for giving us our boy back’. (Parent of Child Survivor)

To continue our work please donate today and buy a tile. In so doing you are giving an adult or a child hope and a way forward, ensuring they are not left alone to face the trauma from the abuse they have experienced.

Your support will help us to maintain Diana House and to be there for those who need our services when they need them.

Messages from those we've helped -

A big thank you for so much understanding. I have been on a journey and cannot thank PARCS enough. My past is always with me but I hope now I can move on.

I feel I have been able to accept the past and place it where it should be – in the past.

I have managed to let go of the guilt. I have felt over my past and realised that all that happened to me was not my fault.

PARCS has been so valuable for me in helping me through and teaching me that it wasn’t my fault , that I am free, strong and valuable......I am worth something! A big thank you to everyone at PARCS.

Thank you, thank you, thank you PARCS. Recovery takes time – there are no shortcuts, but there is a way to inner peace with your help.

PARCS saved my life! Without them I would not be here. With their help I was able to become the person I should always have been. Thank you!!!!!

PARCS support has enabled me to change the way I see myself, my past and my future. I have experienced such care, regard and expertise and the effect on my life is profound.

I have been coming to PARCS for over a year now and would not be anywhere close to where I have progressed to now had it not been for PARCS. It is the best centre for professional help I have ever been to.